says I can’t baptize him on the grounds that he likes sex.”
He flipped through more papers. “The deacons think it would have what they call a negative effect on the total amount of pledges. The ushers don’t want tourists in here with cameras. Three men and nine women think baptizing him would somehow let loose his animal lusts and no one would be safe in the church alone.”
He held up another letter triumphantly, this one written on pale pink rosebudded stationery. “You asked us Sunday what we thought about apes having souls. I think so. I like to sit in back because of my arthritis which is very bad. During the invocation there were three tots in front of me with their little hands folded in prayer and just inside the vestry door was your ape, with his head bowed and his hands folded too.’” He held up the paper. “My only ally. And she thinks it’s cute to watch a full-grown orangutan fold his little hannies. How am I supposed to come to any kind of decision with advice like this? Even Natalie’s determined to make him into something he isn’t. Clothes and good manners and standing up straight. And I’m supposed to decide!”
Moira had listened to his rantings with a patient expression. Now she stood up. “That’s right, Will. It is your decision, not Natalie’s, not your congregations', not the Charles'. You’re supposed to decide.”
He watched her to her bicycle through the star of broken glass. “Damn the Congregationalists!” he said under his breath.
He sorted all the mail into three piles of “for” and “against” and “wildly insane,” then threw all of them into the wastebasket. He called in Natalie and Esau so he could give Esau the order to put up the protective plastic webbing over the big stained glass window. Natalie was alarmed. “What is it?” she asked when Esau had left with the storeroom key in his hand. “Have there been threats?”
He showed her the message from the rock, but didn’t mention the letters. “I’ll take him home again with me tonight,” he said. “When does he have to go to Colorado Springs?”
“Tomorrow,” She had fished a letter out of the wastebasket and was reading it. “We could cancel. They already know the situation,” she said and then blushed.
“No. He’s probably safer there than here.” He let some of the tiredness creep into his voice.
“You aren’t going to do it, are you?” Natalie said suddenly “Because of a lot of creeps!” She slammed the letter down on his desk. “You’re going to listen to them, aren’t you? A lot of creeps who don’t even know what a soul is and you’re going to let them tell you Esau doesn’t have one!” She went to the door, the tails of the yellow stole flying. “Maybe I should just tell them to keep him tomorrow, since you don’t want him.”
The doors slamming dislodged another splinter of glass.
Reverend Hoyt went to the South Denver Library and checked out books on apes and St. Augustine and sign language. He read them in his office until it was nearly dark outside. Then he went to get Esau. The protective webbing was up on the outside of the window. There was a ladder standing in the sanctuary. The window let in the dark blue evening light and the beginning stars.
Esau was sitting in one of the back pews, his short legs straight out in front of him on the velvet cushions. His arms hung down, palms out. He was resting. The dustcloth lay beside him. His wide face held no expression except the limpness of fatigue. His eyes were sad beyond anything Reverend Hoyt had ever seen.
When he saw Reverend Hoyt he climbed down off the pew quite readily They walked to the parish house. Esau immediately went to find the cat.
The people from Cheyenne Mountain came quite early the next morning. Reverend Hoyt noticed their van in the parking lot. He saw Natalie walk Esau to the van. The young man from the center opened the door and said something to Natalie. She nodded and smiled rather shyly at him. Esau got in the back seat of the van. Natalie leaned in and hugged him goodbye. When the van drove off he was sitting looking out the window, his face impassive. Natalie did not look in Reverend Hoyt’s direction.
They brought him back about noon the next day. Reverend Hoyt saw the van again, and shortly afterward Natalie brought the young man to his office. She was dressed all in white, a childishly full surplice over a white robe. She looked like an angel in a Sunday school program. Pentecost must be over and Trinity begun. She was still subdued, more than the situation of having her friends argue for her would seem to merit. Reverend Hoyt wondered how often this same young man came for Esau.
“I thought you would like to know how things are going down at the Center, sir,” the young man said briskly “Esau passed his physical, though there is some question of whether he might need glasses. He has a slight case of astigmatism. Otherwise he is in excellent physical condition for a male of his age. His attitude toward the breeding program has also improved markedly in the past few months. Male orangs become rather solitary, neurotic beings as they mature, sometimes becoming very depressed. Esau was not, up until a few months ago, willing to breed at all. Now he participates regularly and has impregnated one female.
“What I came to say, sir, is that we feel Esau’s job and the friends he has made here have made him a much happier and better adjusted ape than he was before. You are to be congratulated. We would hate to see anything interfere with the emotional well-being he has achieved so far.”
This is the best argument of all, Reverend Hoyt thought. A happy ape is a breeding ape. A baptized ape is a happy ape. Therefore…
“I understand,” he said, looking at the young man. “I have been reading about orangutans, but I have questions. If you could give me some time this afternoon, I would appreciate it.”
The young man glanced at his watch. Natalie looked uncomfortable. “Perhaps after the news conference. That lasts until…” He turned to Natalie. “Is it four o'clock, Reverend Abreu?”
She tried to smile. “Yes, four. We should be going. Reverend Hoyt, if you’d like to come—”
“I believe the bishop is coming later this afternoon, thank you.” The young man took Natalie’s arm. “After the press conference,” Reverend Hoyt continued, “please have Esau put the ladder away. Tell him he does not need to use it.”
“But—”
“Thank you, Reverend Abreu.”
Natalie and her young man went to their press conference. He closed all the books he had checked out from the library and stacked them on the end of his desk. Then he put his head in his hands and tried to think.
“Where’s Esau?” the bishop said when she came in.
“In the sanctuary, I suppose. He’s supposed to be putting the webbing on the inside of the window.”
“I didn’t see him.”
“Maybe Natalie took him with her to her press conference.”
She sat down. “What have you decided?”
“I don’t know. Yesterday I managed to convince myself he was one of the lower animals. This morning at three I woke from a dream in which he was made a saint. I am no closer to knowing what to do than I have ever been.”
“Have you thought, as my archbishop would say, who cannot forget his Baptist upbringing, about what our dear Lord would do?”
“You mean, ‘Who is my neighbor? And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves.’ Esau said that, you know. When I asked him if he knew that God loved him he spelled out the word Samaritan.”
“I wonder,” Moira said thoughtfully “Did he mean the good Samaritan or—”
“The odd thing about it was that Natalie’d apparently taught him some kind of shorthand sign for good Samaritan, but he wouldn’t use it. He kept spelling the word out, letter by letter.”
“How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?”
“What?”
“John 4. That’s what the Samaritan woman said to Jesus at the well.”
“You know, one of the first apes they raised with human parents used to have to do this test where she sorted through a pile of pictures and separated the humans from the apes. She could do it perfectly, except for one mistake. She always put her own picture in the human pile.” He stood up and went and stood at the doors. “I have thought all along that the reason he wanted to be baptized was because he didn’t know he wasn’t human. But he knows. He knows.”
“Yes,” said the bishop. “I think he does.”
They walked together as far as the sanctuary. “I didn’t want to ride my bicycle today,” she said. “The reporters recognize it. What is that noise?”
